Giving her heart to campus

The person who I chose to write about is someone that I actually have had the privilege to work alongside with, and have seen the proof that she works hard for the UNH community. Her name is Mary Anne Lustgraaf and she is the Director of the MUB. The Memorial Union building is considered the heart of campus, and Lustgraaf is always saying how she takes pride in the important role that it plays in the life of students at UNH.

Lustgraaf started as the director in August of 2001. At the time she had been looking for a job and saw the open position advertised in the Chronicle of Higher Education. She had previously been a union director at another university.

As the director here at UNH, Mary Anne does everything from helping coordinate building and student activities to training sessions with student employees. She knows just about everything that’s happening in and around the MUB. As is fitting for working at the heart of campus, Lustgraaf says that her favorite part about her job is building community. This isn’t surprising. At the student employee training sessions, Lustgraaf is always encouraging students to be accepting and supportive of EVERYONE in our community, in order to make the MUB a place where others feel comfortable and happy.

 While Lustgraaf’s job has its perks, it doesn’t mean that it’s easy. Lustgraaf said the most challenging aspect of her job is “doing more with less and still moving forward.”

In addition to her duties as a director, Lustgraaf also plays an active role in UNH’s effort to stay green. Lustgraaf has worked with environmentally conscious organizations through activities such as clean up days, and also with adding new features to the MUB like the Hydration Station. Along side her busy schedule, Lustgraaf said she also enjoys gardening, officiating swimming, and travel in her free time.

Favorite Multimedia Examples (so far)

         I spent some time browsing through the plethora of multimedia projects that exist on the web, and have found a few that are my favorite so far. The first, a still photography project called "The Bottom Line" by Mona Reeder, really stuck out to me as great photojournalism. This project was one of the first still photography collections that I looked at and after continuing to browse around, I went back to it. Just one look through this collection and I was instantly moved; the pictures were powerful and related information about Texas that I was completely unaware of. One picture that stood out for me was of a woman and her just deceased sister whom she had taken the oxygen tube from because she needed it in her moment of intense grief. Without reading the caption below, I already had an idea of what was happening and I think this is an example of great reporting. The picture is telling a story on its own. Another aspect that I think is working in this collection is that all of the photos are done in black and white. For me this gave the collection a cohesive and polished look. The Bottom Line inspired me to want to practice my portraiture.
           Next is an audio clip done by Jake Warga, called "Dubai and the Desert". I have a friend who lived in Dubai for a while and it was interesting to hear this reporting after hearing her stories about the huge mall and biggest building in the world. I think Warga was effective in how he used background sounds to go along with the speaking, for example I could hear the music and call to prayers that were being played in the mall. There is also a good mix between Warga's commentary to describe what was happening with commentary from interviewees.
           The third, called "Undesired" by Walter Estrada, was the perfect example of an ethical dilemma that can bring such a powerful message when the combination of still photos, video, audio, and a bit of short text come together. I also learned a lot of information in "Undesired" about the Indian culture of female rejection that disturbed and surprised me. One technique that I thought was effective in this project was how the videographer had the interviewees be still and look at the camera as the video and audio of that person speaking was rolling, and then eventually they would sync up and you could see and hear that person talking at the same time. Overall, I was pretty amazed by Undesired.